In Spain, a new “socially progressive budget” for 2019 will restrict advertising for licensed gambling. The new budget was created in a deal between Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez of the Socialist Workers’ Party and Pablo Iglesias, the socialist Podemos party leader.
The budget will include a mandate to restrict the advertising of “predatory industries” like betting, pay-day loans and credit lending, which target Spanish consumers. According to the leading Spanish newspaper, El Pais, the PSOE will “treat betting like tobacco” and establish tougher restrictions designed to protect minors and problem gamblers. The budget document claims such measures are necessary because sports broadcasts are “flooded with ads that offer live betting,” which is “generating serious addiction problems.”
In addition, the new rules are expected to dramatically limit betting-related advertisements aired during TV and radio sports broadcasts. Also, the new advertising code will ban Spanish-licensed operators from featuring celebrities or athletes to promote gambling products and services.
Mikel Lopez de Torre, president of the Spanish online gaming operators association jDigital, said the new restrictions will only benefit the online black market, since Spanish-licensed operators’ ability to advertise locally is “the only differential weapon” they have to compete with internationally licensed sites.
The Spanish Association of Advertisers also opposes the new guidelines, claiming they will lose the lucrative revenue stream derived from Spain’s gaming sector. Spanish sports teams and associations also are concerned they’ll lose profitable gambling sponsorships.
Other European nations have restricted gambling advertising, including Italy which approved a total prohibition of gambling ads this summer, and the United Kingdom where licensed operators proposed self-bans to avoid stricter government-imposed regulations.
